California's addiction to immigrant labor

Chapman University professor Esmael Adibi holds the attention of economic students during a dynamic lecture. When he came to California from Iran in 1974, he planned to get a doctorate and then return to Iran. He hoped to become a researcher in the central bank, one of a handful of Ph.D.'s helping set economic policy, but the Iranian revolution changed everything.CINDY YAMANAKA, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

Part one of four: This article is the first in a four-part series. For a preview of upcoming installments, visit the series at a glance.

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Over the past four decades, the state has come to depend on immigrant brains and brawn to an extent unmatched by any other state and almost any developed country.

That puts the state at the center of a politically charged debate over immigration for at least the third time in its history. Nowhere else are the numbers greater or the stakes higher.

As Congress prepares to act on immigration – to restrict or expand it, to offer illegal immigrants "a path to citizenship" or to harass them until they leave – success or failure will depend in large part on how that policy works in California.

The Orange County Register analyzed four decades of datafrom the U.S. Census Bureau, reviewed more than 100 reportsand interviewed dozens of experts and immigrants to weigh the enormous and often misunderstood impact of immigrants on the California economy.

Among our conclusions:

California is home to more immigrants, 9.8 million, than any foreign country save Russia and Germany. Most are here legally, the product of the largest wave of legal immigration in a century.

9.8 million immigrants: See "Native and foreign-born, all states, 1850-2008," Register analysis of Census data. "More than any foreign country save Russia and Germany": See "World Bank estimate of migrants by country, 2005" based on United Nations population division estimates; the 12 million immigrants in Russia include several million people born in other nations of the former Soviet Union. "Most are here legally": Widely accepted estimates by the Pew Hispanic Center and the Department of Homeland Security put the illegal immigrant population at 11 million nationwide and about 2.55 million in California, or less than a third of the total foreign-born population as counted by the Census Bureau. "Largest wave of legal immigration in a century": See "Legal Immigration Summary, 1907-2009" Register analysis of Department of Homeland Security data.

A third of California workers are immigrants, a far higher proportion than any other state and any advanced economy save tiny Luxembourg. Together they earned $260 billion in 2008 – more than the state spent on imports of oil, cars and electronics combined.

"A third of California workers": 34.3% in 2008; see "Native and foreign-born workers, CA, 1950-2008" Register analysis of Census PUMS data. "Any other state": The states with the next highest rates are New York (27.0 percent), New Jersey (25.6 percent), Nevada (25.2 percent) and Florida (23.8 percent), according to "Foreign labor force by state, 1980-2005" Migration Policy Institute, 2008. "And any advanced economy": See "Immigrant workers by nation, 2000" based on a survey by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development of 28 developed nations; only one of the 28, Luxembourg, had a higher percentage of immigrant workers – 42.9 percent. Luxembourg is a banking center with a work force of 191,000, roughly twice the size of Irvine's. "Together they earned $250 billion in 2008"; see "Income of native and foreign-born workers, CA, 2008" Register analysis of Census PUMS data. "More than the state spent on imports"; see "California trade statistics, detailed, 1998-2008" from California Department of Finance; these are totals for all goods imported through California ports and include products shipped to other states after passing through customs here.

Nearly a tenth of the state's workers, 1.75 million people, are illegal immigrants. They're here because of a tacit consensus in Washington to spend billions fortifying the border while doing almost nothing to prevent illegal immigrants from finding work once they cross or to catch those who overstay their visas.

Immigrants have filled most of the new jobs created in California since 1970. Without them, the state's workforce would have shrunk in the 1990s.

"Filled most of the new jobs"; see "Native and foreign-born workers, CA, 1970-2008" Register analysis of IPUMS data; immigrants filled 52 percent of all jobs created from 1970 through 2008 and 70.6 percent from 1990 through 2008; during the 1990s, the native work force declined by 115,000.

Immigration has helped middle and upper-income Californians economically while driving down wages for those with the fewest job skills.

See part 3 of this series.

The immigrant workforce includes people like Daniel Lee, who left postwar Korea to study in America and stayed to become an architect. And Alma Nieto, who fled the Sandinista regime in her native Nicaragua, slipped into California through a sewer pipe and became a church secretary. And Maria Rosa, a cosmetologist, one of millions of Mexicans who walked away from poverty at home for an illegal but more prosperous life in the United States.

'NO PLACE BUT CALIFORNIA'

Today, most of the state's housekeepers, painters and cooks are immigrants. So are half of its software developers, a third of its registered nurses and a quarter of its business executives. A generation ago, natives of the United States dominated all of these jobs, indeed almost every occupation.

Most of the workers in Santa Ana and central Los Angeles, places filled with tiny businesses and garment factories, are immigrants. But immigrants make up nearly half the workers in much of Silicon Valley, including the hometowns of Apple and Google.

"Most of the workers in Santa Ana": See interactive map on "Maps" tab and "Foreign-born workforce by PUMA, 2006-2008" (spreadsheet), Register analysis of Census PUMS data. A PUMA is a Public Use Microdata Area, an area with about 100,000 residents, the smallest area for which the Census reports microdata.

And no matter what Congress does, the role of immigrant families in the California economy is certain to grow: Nearly half of the state's children have an immigrant parent.

It is the product of economic and demographic shifts that have been decades in the making. It is also the result of policy choices – deliberate and unintended.

And it has echoes in our past.

A third of the forty-niners came from foreign lands, leaving their mark on gold camps like Dutch Flat, English Mountain, Irish Hill, Chinese Camp, Canada Hill, French Corral and Spanish Flat.

"A third of the Forty-Niners": See "Native and foreign-born, all states, 1850-2008" a Register analysis based on Census Bureau Tech Paper 29, Table 13. The 1850 census, conducted amidst the chaos of the Gold Rush, reported that 23.5 percent of California residents were foreign-born; that did not include San Francisco – then the largest city west of St. Louis – because returns from the city were destroyed by fire. The 1850 Census is online here. The 1860 census, conducted under calmer conditions, found that 38.6 percent of California residents were foreign-born. "Gold camps": These place names all appear on the "Gold Rush Mining Districts" map,Atlas of California, by Michael W. Donley, Stuart Allan, Patricia Caro and Clyde P. Patton, Pacific Book Center, 1979, page 14.

In 1861, New York native William Brewer marveled at the crowd attending Mass at Mission Santa Barbara: Americans, Irish, French, Italians, Spanish, even two Chinese.

"No place but California can produce such groups," Brewer wrote.

Up and Down California in 1860:1864: The Journal of William H. Brewer, edited by Francis P. Farquhar, University of California Press, 1930 (reprinted 1966), pages 69-70. This is a classic of early California history, written by a Yale-educated scientist who was second-in-command of the Whitney Survey. He was the first to climb 13,570-ft. Mount Brewer in the central Sierra Nevada; from the top he spotted a much higher group of peaks to the southeast, including the peak later named for his boss, Josiah Whitney.

But during the sharp depression of the 1870s, white Californians saw the Chinese as a threat to their livelihoods. Their shout – "The Chinese must go!" – led to the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, the first restrictive immigration law in the nation's history.

"Their shout": See California: The Great Exception, by Carey McWilliams, University of California Press, 1948, for an account of the rise of the Workingmen's Party and its leader, Denis Kearney. In 1880, 71.2 percent of the nation's 105,000 Chinese residents lived in California; for details, see the 1880 Census online here; click on the Zip file to download Volume 1, then open "1880a_v1-03.pdf" and go to page 7. "Chinese Exclusion Act": California had unusual political clout in the early 1880s because it was a swing state; it voted Republican in the 1876 presidential race, turned Democratic (by a statewide margin of 144 votes) in 1880 and reverted to the Republican side in 1884. "The first restrictive immigration law": A 1798 law, the Alien Friends Act, part of the notorious Alien and Sedition Acts, gave the president the power to deport aliens suspected of radical opinions. But the Chinese Exclusion Act was the first law to bar immigrants from entering; it remained on the books until 1943 when it was repealed as a gesture to World War II ally China.

Chapman University professor Esmael Adibi holds the attention of economic students during a dynamic lecture. When he came to California from Iran in 1974, he planned to get a doctorate and then return to Iran. He hoped to become a researcher in the central bank, one of a handful of Ph.D.'s helping set economic policy, but the Iranian revolution changed everything. CINDY YAMANAKA, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
Chapman University professor Esmael Adibi jokes with students and leads them through a lively discussion in his economics class. CINDY YAMANAKA, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
Esmael Adibi, professor of economics at Chapman University, then (1974), studies a photograph of himself when he first came to the United States. He earned an MBA from Chapman while studying for his master's degree from Cal State Fullerton. He eventually got his Ph.D. from Claremont Graduate University. CINDY YAMANAKA, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
Esmael Adibi, professor of economics at Chapman University, arrived in Los Angeles with one suitcase in 1974. The Iranian revolution prevented him from was returning to his native Iran where he had hoped to help set economic policy. CINDY YAMANAKA, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
A scholarly view as seen from Chapman University professor Esmael Adibi's economic class. In April 1974, Adibi left Iran, one suitcase in hand, to study at this university. CINDY YAMANAKA, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
Retired architect Daniel Lee was on the St. Thomas Korean Catholic Center construction committee which advised architects on ways to harmonize Korean style with Catholic architecture. The Fullerton resident was born in Seoul, South Korea and is a naturalized citizen. CINDY YAMANAKA, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
Daniel (Changmin) Lee, center in suit, departed in style when his entire family saw him off at the airport in Seoul, Korea. He came to the United States in 1955 at age 20. He was part of South Korea's best and brightest who ventured to America for higher education. CINDY YAMANAKA, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
Daniel (Changmin) Lee, at age 20, and his mother Chung Hi Lee at the airport in Seoul, Korea before his departure to America in 1955. He studied architecture at Ohio State University. The Fullerton resident is now an American citizen and is married with three American-born children. CINDY YAMANAKA, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
Daniel Lee came to Ohio State University in 1955 to become a doctor, but the pre-med program was filled so he enrolled in the architecture program. The retired architect was part of the construction committee for St. Thomas Korean Catholic Center in Anaheim. CINDY YAMANAKA, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
Alma Nieto of Orange, from left, and her mother Miriam Mayorga of Nicaragua receive communion from Rev. Avelino Orozceo of La Purissima Catholic Church at Nieto's home. Nieto, the church's office manager, drew on her faith when she crawled through a sewer pipe from Tijuana to San Diego to enter the U.S. illegally in 1984. She is now an American citizen. CINDY YAMANAKA, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
Alma Nieto of Orange flashes an easy smile as she talks about her birthplace Nicaragua. Nieto and her husband didn't want to leave, but they felt they had no choice. She had mixed emotions when she became an American citizen. She felt both disloyal to Nicaragua and happy to be an American. Today the U.S. feels like home and she feels out of place in Nicaragua. CINDY YAMANAKA, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
When Alma Nieto of Orange crawled through a sewer pipe from Tijuana to San Diego to enter the U.S., she was not afraid. Her focus was on reuniting with her one-year-old son who had fled with coyotes the day before. CINDY YAMANAKA, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
Alma Nieto of Orange, from left, embraces her mother Miriam Mayorga of Nicaragua after they receive communion from Rev. Avelino Orozceo of La Purissima Catholic Church. Nieto, who was unable to attend church, invited the the Rev. to her home. CINDY YAMANAKA, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
Alma Nieto of Orange at "sweet 16." The Nicaragua native and her husband reluctantly left their country after years of feeling unsafe. When she came to America she worked at McDonald's as a cashier and rose to assistant manager. Today she's an office manager at La Purissima Catholic Church in Orange. "You're country is where your home is," said Nieto. When the Orange resident came to the U.S., people made fun of her accent. Her husband told her no more Spanish language radio, Spanish TV and Spanish conversation. They decided to only speak English in America. CINDY YAMANAKA, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
Alma Nieto, 48 of Orange, in the first grade and today. The Nicaragua native, escorted by a coyote, entered San Diego from Tijuana in 1984. She laughs as she describes herself as young and unafraid back then. CINDY YAMANAKA, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
Francisco and Alma Nieto of Orange look at their legacy. The parents of three reluctantly left their native Nicaragua after years of feeling unsafe and being harassed. One of the last straws came when a boyhood friend, who was a lieutenant in the army, pulled a gun on Francisco and said he had permission to kill him to show power, according to Alma. CINDY YAMANAKA, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

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